Over the past couple of days, I’ve been emailing with a couple of colleagues about this very odd building in Myanmar (nee Burma). Staring at that big box was the main reason I tweeted that “This Burma-NORK nuclear link has me worried.” Allen Thomson, Bruno Tertrais and some folks at VERTIC all found it too …
Prolif. Case Study: Iranian Furnace
by | 2009-08-03 | 13 Comments
click on the image for a larger version Closeup of the cylinder removed from an Iranian furnace. A while ago, I asked if anybody knew what the purpose of a furnace shown in an Iranian video covering the construction of the Safir-Omid space launcher was. Answering this question, as well understanding several other interesting scenes …
What Is North Korea Capable Of?
by | 2009-08-03 | 17 Comments
As regular readers know, there’s something of a dispute in the wonk world over the nature and origins of the North Korean missile program. Basically, it comes down to two issues: First, did a team of Russian scientists and engineers from the Makeyev design bureau in Miass help the North Koreans duplicate the SS-N-6 SLBM, …
Morality and the Bomb
by | 2009-07-31 | 26 Comments
The 1980s were a time of recreational shopping, “morning in America,” and a rare, public debate in the United States over the morality of nuclear deterrence. A high-octane confluence of events contributed to this intense moral debate — the first since the use of nuclear weapons to end World War II. The Reagan administration embraced …
